For handful of GHS juniors, testing glitch voids ACT tests

March 09, 2012|By Michael Jones, HT Staff Writer

GAYLORD — A minor “testing irregularity” during the administration of Tuesday’s ACT test at Gaylord High School voided the tests of nine high school juniors who will have to retake the test later this month.The glitch involved a test proctor mistakenly giving a section of the test out of sequence to the nine students taking the ACT in one of the high school classrooms.

“I commend the staff on their honesty,” said Gaylord Community Schools curriculum director Brian Pearson.

Pearson said the mistake points out the high stakes involved in the ACT test, which Michigan high schools use as part of state’s Michigan Merit Exam (MME) to determine college readiness and student achievement.

The MME and the Michigan Educational Assessment Program (MEAP) factor into the district’s annual yearly progress report card. Failure to perform well could result in sanctions against the school.

“Any irregularity in administering the test and they (ACT) are going to void it,” Pearson said of the company that owns and distributes the standardized test that measures high school achievement and is used for college admissions.

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According to Pearson, as soon as the test proctor realized the mistake, high school administrators were notified of the inadvertent error.

“The proper procedures were followed,” Pearson said.

Although Pearson said the mix-up on the part of the proctor may have seemed insignificant and would not have compromised the administering of the test, he noted the test proctor, as trained, reported the error.“The high school contacted ACT to report it and asked permission to continue administering the test for those nine students, but the answer they received said the tests had to be voided and retaken,” Pearson said, adding the voided tests impacted only the students in the classroom where the error had occurred.The students will have the opportunity to retake the four-hour test on the ACT makeup day, Tuesday, March 20.

Pearson said this is the first time in six years of administering the ACT at the high school in which there was a testing issue.

“Because of the high stakes involved in the results of the test, they (ACT) have to be pretty strict about the test and can’t allow anything which could conceivably compromise the test,” he said. “It’s unfortunate for those (nine) kids that they will have to retake the test. We have apologized to them and to their parents.”